No to U.S intervention in Syrian election

Following is the statement of the International Action Center on the upcoming election in Syria.

The Syrian people are holding a presidential election June 3. What makes this election unique is that it can help protect the sovereignty, even the existence of this country. It can help end the bloody war that has drained the lifeblood of the country. It is seen as an essential step toward national reconciliation.

For the past three years, Syria has been under attack by the U.S., NATO and by the U.S.-allied absolute monarchies that govern Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. They are fighting a proxy war with mercenaries and reactionary sectarian forces that Washington itself recognizes are terrorists — when they’re not carrying out U.S. plans.

Washington’s stated goal is “regime change,” that is, to eliminate the government led by Bashar al-Assad. What “regime change” really means is the destruction of Syria. To bring this about, the U.S. and its allies have financed a war that has killed over 150,000 people and displaced one-third of the 23 million Syrians.

Washington claims they want “democracy” in Syria. But U.S. wars have never brought democracy. Just destruction. Think of what U.S. intervention has brought to Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and the Balkans. Think of the fascists that U.S. intervention put in positions of power in Ukraine. The worst thing that can happen to the Syrians would be for the U.S.-NATO-Saudi forces to win.

Election observers from the U.S. are expected to join observers from the BRICS countries — Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa — and Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Ecuador and other countries, representing the overwhelming majority of the people of the world. This election is a national expression of the fact that the Syrian people are determined to chart their own future.

U.S. anti-war activists, including from the International Action Center and other anti-war organizations, are participating as election observers in Syria. They participate knowing that the overwhelming majority of the U.S. population is against another war. Any such war will not only harm the people of Syria, but also the U.S. population. As Martin Luther King Jr. said in 1967, the bombs that drop on Vietnam — or on Libya or Syria, we need to add — also drop on the inner cities of the United States. They attack the working people in the U.S.

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— WW managing editors: John Catalinotto, Martha Grevatt, Deirdre Griswold, Monica Moorehead, Betsey Piette and Minnie Bruce Pratt.